At 3,776 m high [12,388 feet], a snow covered Mt. Fuji is delightful to look at from a distance and an impressive, even mystical, symbol of traditional Japan. In reality, however, it is an extremely large volcano surrounded at it’s base by a dense forest. Consequently, when viewed up close in person, much of the trail above the tree line is found to consist of small boulders and rocks which conspire to hinder your walking time on both your ascent and decent routes, even though some of the trails are extremely well traveled.

Also, above a certain altitude you will find you experience noticeable fatigue as your breathing and movements become slower. You are at a height where your body needs time to acclimatize to the much higher altitude. There is little protection from adverse weather, such as lightening, on the barren volcanic slopes except for small rest huts on the upwards climb and virtually no shelter at all on the descent route.

After sunset there is total darkness on the mountainside so take great care to go properly equipped with a few basic essentials and to allow more hours than you think you will need, both ascending and descending, particularly early in the climbing season when you may need to use crampons on some stretches of the trail. If you don’t, you may easily get lost, hurt yourself or selfishly cause others to be injured when trying to rescue you. The ascending trail can often become heavily congested but  during my 2001 descent towards the end of the afternoon I was amazed to have stumbled across a 9 year old boy who had run on ahead of his parents and had become separated as darkness fell, followed a few minutes later by an older couple who were slightly disabled and had fallen behind and later still a middle age businessman who had missed a sign marking the trail in the darkness and was crouched on the ground unsure of where he was.

Until recently Mt. Fuji was believed to be a dormant volcano, but observations of low frequency vibrations below the mountain in 2000 and 2001 revealed it to be active. Although Fuji has not had a major eruption since the early 1700’s it has killed and injured many climbers, especially those that have strayed from the approved trails, taken short cuts or climbed out of season without winter equipment.

Please prepare properly before you go and you will have a safe and enjoyable trek !